Mick Hartley

On occasion in the past I've complained that the BBC doesn't do enough to show the reality of the racism that disfigures the Middle East. Well, last night they finally showed a film on that very topic in their Storyville BBC4 late night slot. Predictably enough, though, this was no overdue exposee of the virulent antisemitism that a site like MEMRI regularly exposes in the Arab and Iranian media. The subject of the film was – of course – Israel.

Forever Pure – Football and Racism in Jerusalem:

Documentary which follows events at Israel's most notorious football club. Beitar Jerusalem FC is the most popular team in Israel and the only club in the Premier League never to sign an Arab player. Midway through a season the club's owner, Russian-Israeli oligarch Arcadi Gaydamak, brought in two Muslim players from Chechnya in a secretive transfer deal that triggered the most racist campaign in Israeli sport and sent the club spiralling out of control. Forever Pure follows the famous football club through the tumultuous season, as power, money and politics fuel a crisis and shows how racism is destroying both the team and society from within.

The film, directed by former Haaretz journalist Maya Zinshtein, was premiered at this year's Toronto Film Festival:

Beitar Jerusalem Football Club is the most controversial sports team in Israel. Loyal fans, known as La Familia, take pride in Beitar being the only team in the Israeli Premier League that has never fielded an Arab player. In 2012, team owner Arcadi Gaydamak, a Russian-born billionaire and failed mayoral candidate in Jerusalem, signs two Muslim players from Chechnya. Their presence turns La Familia into opponents of their own team and initiates an ideological contest with wide ripples.

Filmmaker Maya Zinshtein embeds herself inside the locker room and among the fans, as they are caught up in the manic and intersecting worlds of sports, religious fanaticism, and Israeli politics. The young Chechen players, Zaur Sadayev and Dzhabrail Kadiyev, isolated from their homeland, are taunted by calls of "death to Arabs" and live under constant threat. The Israeli players are caught between loyalty for their new teammates and allegiance to their old fans. When team captain Ariel Harush attempts to bridge the divide, he pays dearly for it.

Forever Pure is a disturbing portrait of a society driven to extremism, where hundreds of spectators gleefully chant "we are the most racist team," and where Israel's defence minister Avigdor Liberman legitimizes the hostility by praising the club as an embodiment of nationalism. At a time when societies all over the world are bracing against rising waves of racism and ethnic persecution, Forever Pure is a cautionary tale of mob behaviour, and a sympathetic look at the human beings caught in the middle.

From this morning's Guardian review:

It is a sickening, brutal film that leaves you feeling numb and pessimistic, about the area, and humanity. “The things you see in the east stand are a concentrated, an amplified version of the behaviour in our society,” says Korenfine. Of course, the deep-rooted hate isn’t found just on one side. Beitar’s final game, which they mustn’t lose in order to stay up, is against the Israeli Arab club Bnei Sakhnin. “Beitar fans, they are all sick, with swine flu, they should die young,” sing Bnei Sakhnin supporters, wearing medical masks. “Death to the Arabs, death to the Arabs,” comes the inevitable reply from La Familia who have come back for the special occasion. It makes the north London derby look like a big cuddly love-in….

The postscripts don’t offer much hope either. Sadayev and Kadiyev leg it home to Chechnya as soon as the final whistle blows. Everyone involved in them coming, or who accepted them when they got there – Gaydamak, Korenfine, Harush, Eli Cohen, the manager – is now no longer at the club. One nil to the mob, and their rule. “Here we are, the most racist team in the country,” they sing, proudly.

It's tempting to echo Shylock: Hath Jews not racist football fans? If you insult us, do some of us not shout abuse and behave disgracefully? Are the Jews not like everybody else?

My point isn't to criticise the film or its director. It's not only part and parcel of a free society to turn over the stones and look at what's underneath – it's absolutely vital. And this is undoubtedly a powerful piece of film-making, even though it by no means represents the norm in Israeli football. The point is that this is one side of a two-sided debate over the relations between Jews and Arabs in the Middle East, and only one side is playing by these rules. It's inconceivable that such a film would be made in an Arab Muslim country – not only because the necessary freedom and culture of self-criticism isn't there, but also because the idea of a Jew playing in any football team in these countries is generally laughable. Indeed we've seen many cases of sportsmen and women simply refusing to compete against Jews. 

It's the same old story: a free society exposes its underbelly; an unfree society keeps its dirty secrets hidden. For the easy moraliser – and this is nowhere more true than with the Israel-Palestine dispute - Israel is condemned as a sick racist society, and therefore the one to blame, precisely because all we hear is this one side. A truly responsible media would make efforts to show both sides – but this is what the BBC never does.